Duality

there are moments of astonishment and resignation that hold me forever in debt and bondage to the memories I harbor from living a childhood in a small, factory town,
in a family in constant battle

I belonged to a family with a fatal attraction to intensity,
to instant gratification,
to outrageousness of response

we were instinctive, not thoughtful,
connoisseurs of fight and flight,
never happy unless we waged our own private war against the rest of the world,
priding ourselves in our ability to survive

and the war just repeated and repeated itself,
only revealing itself to be a war against ourselves,
lives in constant, unrelenting tension,
always dancing with blind risk and driven by fear of exposure,
a life composed of ice and falling rock

these frequent moments of surprise and consecration center around a singular fear –
a fear of emptiness in life, nihility, boredom,
the hopelessness of a life devoid of thoughtful action;
it is the death-in-life of the masked perpetuity of middle class,
the fear of the kind of deep dive that brings forth truth which sends a shiver through my soul

I often try to ground myself,
remembering the days so long ago when I buried my tiny bare toes in the clean grass,
the fresh smell of rain seeping through the cheap wooden screen door as I stood, listening, with my innocent forehead pressed against it,
and I try to duplicate it –
if I walk my tired bones before the sun rises,
take the time to breathe in the silence of the air and feel the moonlight on my face,
I am sometimes able to connect myself to the deep hum of the planet,
inject life into the marrow of these papery bones

but if I continuously turn on the television or bury my face in the rabbitole of my phone to avoid an evening alone with myself,
it feels as if I am admitting my membership with the living dead

it is the humble, messy, industrial town part,
the splintered, chaotic part of me that is most quintessentially and fiercely alive

those small town, tumultuous memories are the ones that infiltrate the entirety of whatever authenticity I continually bring to light as an aging woman

it is an intricate duality that exists –
they can both fuel and extinguish my flame if I let them

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Autumn

the room was quiet but for the near silent whisper of the curtain sheers dusting against the pane,
as the autumn breeze waltzed through the small opening in the window;
peering out, she relished the cool comfort

beyond the long stretch of yellow-tipped, green grass, was a thick wood,
brown trunks stretching into scarlet, papaya, and maize,
swaying in time with the breeze,
a postage stamp echo of the rural wood she knew as a child

closing her eyes, her heart clung to the tree-topped rhythm,
to the familiar, soothing music that belongs only to the autumn,
the peaceful, vibrant tune of youth

-image via Pixabay

Backward

time didn’t seem to pass –
through her tiny eyes, there was only the present,
the right now

yes, she remembered, 
she had so many memories;
but time traveled in an unseen sequence,
one which didn’t require much thought

today is all she felt,
and the concept of tomorrow was barely believable;
being anything other than what she was right that minute was inconceivable;
anything else was almost magic

and then there came a day when the magic came to a screaching halt,
when she realized her eyes were suddenly not so tiny,
and time no longer felt weightless

she wondered what it could have been like to go on thinking about nothing,
to ignore death and fate and the possibility that life can be shaken to its core

this is how she knew she’d left childhood behind –
she felt time’s passing,
and she wished for it to go backward

-image via Pixabay

Gunfire

she was born into chaos,
a warzone where every man
was for himself,
and every woman chased
after the men with the guns,
fear and confusion
knotted and tangled
into her veins

words were
wicked shrapnel,
but lack of words
was the deadly gunfire

Journey of the Heart

there once was a girl inside this chamber
nestled in my heart,
it’s where she safely laughed and played,
so we were never far apart

a very long time ago,
she skipped and giggled free,
until chaos and darkness ruled,
causing her to flee

the darkness began to multiply,
and she’d hide more each day,
before too long she stayed inside,
and never came out to play

I locked tight the chamber door,
to save her innocence,
in hopes one day there’d be a safe place,
in which we could sing and dance

for years she frolicked all alone,
nestled safely in my core,
waiting to trust the sunshine,
so she could play freely once more

then one day my sight transformed,
and I realized the sun had been SHINING,
I’d missed it while guarding the chamber door,
I couldn’t see the silver lining

now she roams, unrestrained,
her smile upon my face,
another set of eyes to see,
on this journey I embrace

-photo credit thememorieskeeper.blogspot.com